Chennai: The Japanese government has proposed to construct an industrial corridor in south India and a senior official would visit here this month for signing a memorandum of understanding (MoU), reports PTI quoting Hiroshima Prefecture governor Hidehiko Yuzaki.

"The Japanese government is planning an industrial corridor in South India... Top officials (from the Japanese government) will be visiting here and sign a memorandum of understanding for the industrial corridor", he told reporters here.

Early in May, during the inauguration of the Japan External Trade Organisation (JETRO) office in Chennai, deputy chief minister M K Stalin had welcomed Japanese government investing in developing industrial corridors between Chennai-Bangalore and Chennai-Ennore, besides setting up a multi-level car park near Chennai.

The officials would be coming later this month, Mr Yuzaki, who is on a four-day visit along with a 30-member delegation from Japan, said.

The delegation, as part of enhancing trade relations between the Tamil Nadu government and Hiroshima (Japan), would sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the state government to carry out activities in promoting investments and people-to-people networking relations, he said.

The University of Hiroshima and Hiroshima International University would also sign a MoU with College of Engineering, Anna University, and Guindy here as part of student exchange programmes.

He said nine Hiroshima Prefecture companies were present in India of which four were operational in Tamil Nadu. During 2000-2009, projects worth $5.3 billion were executed in India.

As of 2008-09, India exported goods worth 300 billion yen to Japan, while it imported 760 billion yen, he said.

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The festive euphoria last week, which saw the Indian market touching fresh closing highs on Thursday and in the brief 'Mahurat' trading session on Friday, marking the beginning of the Hindu accounting year, ended today as the key benchmarks ended lower today.

The market opened in the green this morning riding on last week's festive euphoria. However, investors took the opportunity to book profits at higher levels, dragging the key indices into the red in morning trade. The market fell to the day's lows in the afternoon session and traded in a narrow range after making a feeble recovery attempt. It ended marginally above the low point of the day but below the levels seen late last week.

The Sensex closed 152.58 points (0.73%) lower at 20,852, below its new all-time closing high of 21,005 on Friday. The index touched an intraday high of 21,075 and a low of 20,822 today. The Nifty settled at 6,273, down 39.25 points (0.62%), below its all-time closing high of 6,312 achieved on Friday. The benchmark swung between a high-low of 6,336 and 6,265, respectively.

The market breadth favoured declining stocks today. The Sensex had 21 losers against nine in the advancing list while the Nifty closed with 32 stocks in the red and 18 gainers. The broader indices ended mixed; the BSE Mid-cap index was down 0.08% while the BSE Small-cap index added 0.08%.

Markets in Asia closed mostly higher despite renewed concerns over Greece and Ireland's sovereign debt issues. The development impacted financial stocks in the region while exporters got a boost from the upbeat US jobs data released on Friday.

India today asserted that it was not in the business of "stealing" American jobs, even as US president Barack Obama said that deals with India to create 50,000 jobs back home were aimed at assuaging citizens' fears.

"India is not in the business of stealing jobs from the US... outsourcing (work to India) has helped improve the productive capacity and productivity of America," prime minister Manmohan Singh said at a joint press conference with visiting US president Barack Obama at Hyderabad House in New Delhi.

The US markets closed in the green on Friday. The indices witnessed a flat ending after the Labor Department report showed that employers added 151,000 jobs last month, the first gain since May and better than expected. But payroll data was overshadowed by the unemployment rate which remained stuck at 9.6% for the third straight month.

Anil Ambani-led Reliance Power (RPower) (up 4.27%) on Sunday announced a deal to secure $5 billion (nearly Rs22,000 crore) in funding from the US Export Import Bank for gas-based and renewable energy projects totalling about 9,000MW.

The deal, which coincides with the three-day visit of US president Barack Obama to India, was signed by Reliance Power chairman Anil Ambani and US Exim Bank chairman and president Fred Hochberg on Saturday.

RPower also had announced a deal in the presence of Mr Obama to procure equipment worth about Rs10,000 crore from General Electric and other US companies for its various power and coal mining projects.

The government on Sunday fixed the price band at Rs 85-Rs90 per share for the about Rs7,600 crore follow-on public offer (FPO) of state-run transmission company Power Grid Corporation of India (PGCIL) (down 3.58%).

The FPO comprises over 84 crore equity shares of Rs10 each constituting 20% of the existing paid-up capital. The FPO is slated to hit the market on 9th November. The bids for institutional investors close on 11th November and 12th November for retail and non-institutional bidders.

National Thermal Power Company (NTPC) (down 1.63%) is planning to add 13,000MW of power generation capacity by the end of the XI Five-Year Plan in 2012, contributing to the Centre's plan of adding 68,000MW by 2017. The company aims to become a 75,000-MW company by 2017 and says that it has the core competency to achieve this feat.

NTPC has an installed capacity of about 32,000MW and presently operates 15 coal-based, seven gas-based and four joint venture power stations. It has contributed nearly 33% to the country's total electricity output during the year 2008-09. The company has been allocated six coal blocks for captive usage.

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First Leasing Co of India Ltd said its net profit for the September 2010 quarter rose 2.9% to Rs9.2 crore from Rs8.9 crore same quarter last year. Its total revenues for the September quarter 2010 declined 10.03% to Rs43.7 crore from Rs48.6 crore, First Leasing said in a regulatory filing.

On Monday, First Leasing shares fell 1.9% to Rs91 on the Bombay Stock Exchange, while the benchmark Sensex closed 0.7% down at 20,852 points.